Engrossed as they were, the one with the other, they had insensibly relaxed their pace, becoming mere strollers on the outside edge of the throng.  The sense of being watched came to both of them at once, and, looking up at the same moment, they saw, approaching at a snail’s pace, an open Victoria, in which were two ladies, to whom they were objects of plainly expressed interest.  The elder was an insignificant little woman, who looked as though she were being taken out by her costly furs, while the younger was a girl of some two or three and twenty, of a type of beauty that would have been too imperious had it not been toned down by that air which to the unintelligent means boredom, though the wise know it to spring from something gone amiss in life.  Both ladies kept their eyes fixed so exclusively on Diane that they had almost passed before remembering to salute Derek with a nod.

“I’ve seen those ladies somewhere,” Diane observed, when they had gone by.

“I dare say.  They’ve probably seen you, too.  The elder is Mrs. Bayford, sister of Mr. Grimston, my uncle’s partner in Paris.  The girl is Marion Grimston, his daughter.”

“I remember perfectly now.  They used to come to our charity sales, and—­and—­anything of that kind.”

Pruyn laughed.

“Anything, you mean, that was open to all comers.  Mrs. Grimston would be flattered.”

“I didn’t mean to speak slightingly,” she hastened to say.  “There were plenty of nice people in Paris whom I didn’t know.”

“And plenty, I imagine, who thought you ought to have known them.  Mrs. Grimston, and Mrs. Bayford, too, would have been among that number.”

“Well, you see I do know them—­by sight.  I recall Miss Grimston especially.  She’s so handsome.”

“I shall tell her that to-night.”

“To-night?”

“Yes; it’s with them that Dorothea and I are dining.  The name conveying nothing to you, you probably didn’t remember it.  The fact is that, as Mrs. Bayford is the sister of my uncle’s partner—­my partner, too—­I make it a point to be very civil to her twice a year—­once when I dine with her, and once when she dines with me.  The annual festivals have been delayed this season because she has only just returned from a long visit to Japan and India, with Marion in her wake.”

There had been so much to say which, in the glamour of that glorious afternoon, was more important that no further time was spent on the topic.  Derek forgot the meeting till Mrs. Bayford recalled it to him as he sat beside her in the evening.  She was one of those small, ill-shapen women whose infirmities are thrown into more conspicuous relief by dress and jewels and decolletage.  Seated at the head of her table, she produced the impression of a Goddess of Discord at a feast of well-meaning, hapless mortals.

“I want a word with you,” she said, parenthetically, to Derek, on her left, before turning her attention to the more important neighbor on her right.